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Path: sserve!manuel!munnari.oz.au!spool.mu.edu!mips!sdd.hp.com!usc!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!eff!world!ksr!jfw From: jfw@ksr.com (John F. Woods) Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd Subject: Re: UNIGRAM's article on the USL-BSDI suit Message-ID: <14395@ksr.com> Date: 3 Aug 92 20:04:42 GMT Article-I.D.: ksr.14395 References: <1992Aug1.042344.23428@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> <l7k5fqINNgc9@neuro.usc.edu> <l7k6maINNgeg@neuro.usc.edu> <l7k72rINNgfn@neuro.usc.edu> <leb.712651912@Hypatia> <BZS.92Aug1172816@ussr.std.com> <DRG.92Aug3095931@bubba.ma30.bull.com> Sender: news@ksr.com Lines: 20 drg@bubba.ma30.bull.com (Daniel R Guilderson) writes: >In article <BZS.92Aug1172816@ussr.std.com> bzs@ussr.std.com (Barry Shein) writes: > The fastest and most economical way to resolve this: > Several major research universities form a consortium, each chips in a > few dozen millions and just buys USL. >I have problems with this. How many universities would be able to >meet this challenge. Assume that "a few dozen millions" means at >least $36 million. > ... >Once they have purchased USL, what incentive is there to change tactics? The basic idea is that they would do this to end a serious threat to academic freedom, which could potentially cost them a great deal more than $36M each in legal fees in nickel and dime lawsuits. The flaw is that now that USL has laid the landmine, simply buying USL up and firing all of its lawyers doesn't make the territory safe, someone else is going to try a similar trick eventually. What's really needed is for those major research universities to chip in a few dozen millions each to UCB's defense fund, which would then dwarf USL's revenues, much less what they plan to waste on ensuring they don't have to compete with Carterphone, er, BSDI to survive.